Increasing Your Child’s Educational Potential
by: Jerry Price - Sep 1, 2005 - comment
While many parents believe a child’s first day of school is the first day of his or her education, they couldn’t be more wrong! All parents are teachers, whether they realize it or not, and they are responsible for preparing their children for those vital years in school. Parents should not depend on the school system to do the job that God has assigned to them—being their child’s first teachers and molding them into God-honoring students and citizens.
Parents are responsible for at least these seven key areas of a child’s education:
- Faith. Many teachers are Christians, but many are not. Parents can’t be assured their child’s teachers share their values, beliefs, and convictions. Additionally, teachers are limited in what they can say about things pertaining to faith, even when the subject matter has spiritual aspects. For example, teachers usually are instructed to emphasize that the pilgrims were expressing thankfulness to the Indians, not God. Parents are responsible for instilling a legacy of faith in their children and building in them a foundation for a biblical worldview.
- Character. Lessons on character should begin from the child’s first day of life. These lessons must be taught in two ways—through personal example and personal instruction. If character development is postponed until the child reaches school age, he or she already will have developed negative character traits that teachers and others will be hard-pressed to deal with.
- Self-discipline. Almost every teacher will say that the number one problem in schools today is discipline. Teachers spend too much time dealing with children who have not been taught self-discipline at home, robbing those students and others of time that should be focused on academics.
- Self-esteem. A child must be taught at a young age that as a unique creation of God, he or she has value. While Romans 12:3 says that a person should not “think of himself more highly than he should,” it is reminding each of us to recognize our position before God and others who are in authority.
- Perseverance. It is important for a child to learn from parental example the value of staying with a task to completion. If the child sees a parent giving up or cutting corners just to finish a task, she may learn it is acceptable to do the same in her assignments.
- Respect. Children can be extremely unkind. It doesn’t take much for a child to become the object of ridicule. My son was taught early that he would be in more trouble with me for making fun of someone or being unkind than almost anything else. As a result, his respect for others’ differences developed into compassion, so much so that he once “adopted” a stuffed animal that had no eye buttons because he said it needed someone to care for it. This kind of respect extends to respect for those in authority over the child.
- Responsibility. A child must learn that he, not someone else, is responsible for what he says and does, and for the most part, his success or failure in his future endeavors. He also must learn to appreciate the needs and rights of others—that he is not the only player in the game of life.
Jerry Price is an ERLC staffer whose wife, Trish, has taught in private and public schools for twenty-three years. They are the parents of one son, David.
Further Learning
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